FILE - In this Jan. 29, 2004 file photo, former boxer, Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, holds up the writ of habeas corpus that freed him from prison, during a news conference held in Sacramento, Calif. Carter, who spent almost 20 years in jail after twice being convicted of a triple murder he denied committing, died at his home in Toronto, Sunday, April 20, 2014, according to long-time friend and co-accused John Artis. He was 76. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)

Most people do not know the name H. Lee Sarokin. He is a retired judge of the U.S. District Court of New Jersey and the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. He was born in Perth Amboy and was a graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School.

Like all of us, Sarokin’s life experiences shaped his view of the world and, for him, they established a sense of fairness, justice and a love of writing and music.

As an undergraduate student at Dartmouth, he became a drummer in a jazz band, the Dartmouth Sextet. During a summer break, all the band members hopped on an ocean liner bound for Europe, earning free passage by playing for the passengers nightly. They traveled the continent on bikes, playing music in clubs as well as listening to a lot of the jazz greats who were also in Europe.

The band eventually made its way to Paris, where Sarokin met the great jazz saxophonist James Moody. Moody was around the same age as the members of the sextet, and they all became friends. Moody explained to them that he lived in Paris to escape much of the racism he faced back home in the United States.

It was an eye-opening experience for these Ivy League lovers of music. What Sarokin saw, learned, and heard from hanging out with the not-so-well-to-do in Paris, and having to live day to day, seems to have influenced his judicial philosophy.

As reported by author James Hirsch, Sarokin, after becoming a judge, once fined an attorney $1,000 because he called a 42-year-old black man a “boy” in open court. In another case, he chided the Small Business Administration for aggressively trying to collect a large loan from a white widow who was destitute and suffering from mental illness.

From time to time, judges receive additional training and Sarokin was attending a workshop at a federal prison in North Carolina when he met a inmate serving a 20-year sentence for altering two $2 dollar bills by making them look like $20 bills. The North Carolina judge had sentenced the man to 10 years in federal prison for each bill, even though he had no prior criminal record.

Sarokin contacted the American Civil Liberties Union, persuading the organization to take the man’s case, eventually leading to a pardon granted by President Ronald Reagan.

In 1985, Judge Sarokin, then of the Newark Division of the U.S. District Court, received one of the most high-profile petitions for habeas corpus ever submitted in New Jersey. The other judges, most likely, were quietly celebrating that they did not have to put their reputations at risk by having to handle the case.

Habeas corpus is essentially a procedure to request the release of someone under detention, by stating why the individual is being held unjustly due to a lack of evidence or custodial authority. The individual in the 1985 case had been in prison 19 years for a triple homicide. This was his last attempt in obtaining his release, as all other appeals had been denied.

The situation appeared bleak for the incarcerated man, whose name was Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, a former contender for the middleweight boxing championship. I think most people, due to numerous books including Hirsch’s “Hurricane: The Miraculous Journey of Rubin Carter,” as well as the movie, “The Hurricane” starring Denzell Washington, know that Carter’s conviction was overturned — and he was set free, long before DNA testing became available.

Carter and Artis were profiled, set up, and conspired against repeatedly by a system controlled by a few, who were allowed to operate unquestioned and unchallenged.

In a 70-page opinion written by Sarokin, he found that the state had violated the rights of Carter and Artis on two separate grounds. He wrote, “The jury was permitted to draw inferences of guilt based solely on race of the petitioners, but yet was denied information which may have supported their claims of innocence.”

Can you imagine spending 6,913 days in jail for something you know that you did not do? After his release, Rubin Carter, like many of those jazz musicians of the ’40s and ’50s, never again resided in his country of birth.

Rubin “Hurricane Carter” died last week in Canada from complications of prostate cancer. He left the legacy that there is no place for the innocent in prison.

Milton W. Hinton Jr. is director of equal opportunity for the Gloucester County government. He is past president of the Gloucester County Branch NAACP. His column states his personal views, not those of any organization or agency. Email: mwhjr678@gmail.com.